Settlement checks in title insurance suit bounce

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Lawyers who won a $27.5 million settlement from four title insurance companies are having some headaches distributing the proceeds to more than 66,000 Michigan homeowners who were plaintiffs in the case. The checks, averaging $345, went in the mail last week. But 594 of the checks bounced, leaving their recipients to pay bad check fees. Jeff Yellen, a Farmington Hills lawyer representing the homeowners, told the Detroit Free Press he hired a Minneapolis-based consulting firm to handle the payout of the settlement. He blamed the bounced checks on an error by the Minneapolis bank that processed them. Yellen said the bank will reissue the checks, tacking $20 onto each one to cover bad-check charges. The rest of the 66,000-plus checks were good, he said. Yellen and two other attorneys filed...